The Roadmap to Rome

Forty Steps
to Spiritual Apostasy as Prefigured in Acts
chapters 27 and 28.

By Dr. Douglas Stauffer

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LearntheBible.org

The
position of Mr. Hudson refuted by Dr. Douglas D. Stauffer (blue print)

I sent
this article to Mr. Hudson prior to posting it on the internet. His
response was very simple: “No,
I'm not going to comment on the article you emailed me, and I'm under
no obligation to comment on it or anything else you send.” This is true; I can’t force him to answer me, but take note of his
comments to me when I did not quickly answer him concerning an email
he sent me:“I
have always been able to discover that Ruckmanites never bite like
they bark, and when the heat is on them they run for cover, duck and
dodge the issue.” Eventually
(within one week), I answered his subject email, but to date, he has “run
for cover, ducked, and dodged” the following issue.

"KING
JAMES-ONLYISM" and
the "Egyptian
Corruption"Argument

By Gary
Hudson (black print, emphasis in red)

A
friend recently asked me about one of the common objections raised
by the KJV-Only movement to the use of "any
manuscripts that come from Egypt." One particular preacher
he sat under was very fond of launching into a tirade against "those
evil modern bibles" because "they're
based on manuscripts out of Egypt"
and "the Bible says Egypt is a type of the
WORLD!" This
is obviously typical of Peter Ruckman,
Chick Publications, Gail Riplinger, J. J. Ray, and other KJV "defenders" who
recklessly throw every device they can concoct against the early
manuscripts of the Greek New Testament. They reason as thus: "The
Bible says Egypt is a type of the world; the world is associated
with sin; therefore, it must logically follow that Alexandrian
manuscripts are
evil."This
is certainly a
"case study" in one of the best examples
of "guilt by association"ever
imagined.

Talk
about guilt by association…almost without fail the modern version supporters
attempt to liken everyone that believes the Bible to Ruckman
and Ruckmanism. The motive for this attempt at “guilt by association” is
Dr. Ruckman’s sometimes unpleasant demeanor toward those that overtly
attack the Bible and his damaged marriage record.

For
the record, my faith and trust in the word of God, and that of innumerable
other men and women, has nothing to do with Ruckman or Ruckmanism.
Yet every Bible critic tries to associate the King James Bible believing
position with this one man. His school-- let alone, Pensacola, Florida--
is not large enough to accommodate all those of us who are not alumni,
yet believe the Bible no less. Mr. Hudson continues:

Actually,
the Bible’s making "Egypt a type of the world" (which,
by the way, is not explicitly stated in the Bible, only implied),
does not mean it teaches that all other regions of the planet are untainted
by sin.
In fact, it implies the very opposite! If the Bible teaches that "Egypt
is a type of the WORLD," then it DOES "logically follow" that "the
whole WORLD is typified by Egypt" — which, in the case of KJV-Onlys,
would make no region of the entire planet safe for preserving Bible
manuscripts! (Read 1John 5:19).

Bible
Believers are not talking about any place being “untainted by sin.” The “whole
world lieth in wickedness (1John 5:19),” but
if you had a choice between the Vatican and your favorite church, which
would YOU believe had a greater likelihood of preserving Bible
truths? If you had a choice between the known infidels and true Christianity,
which would you choose? What if the choice were between the hotbed
of Islam (Egypt) and the area where believers were first called Christians? “…And
the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch” (Acts
11:26). With this in mind, we will consider the biblical evidence
associated with Egypt and with Antioch!

Mr.
Hudson’s analogy is extreme. Paul clarifies Mr. Hudson’s type of extremism
in judging these types of issues in his first letter to the Corinthian
church. Evidently, the Apostle Paul had written to the Corinthians
not to keep company with fornicators, but like most Christians, they
took this wise counsel to a reckless extreme. Paul says: “I wrote
unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators: 10 Yet
not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous,
or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out
of the world. 11 But now I have written unto you not to keep company,
if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or
an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such
an one no not to eat” (1Corinthians 5:9-11).

Because
of their extremism, Paul had to clarify the point. He told them that
they would have to leave the world in order to avoid being around someone
(or some place) untainted by sin. Nevertheless, if a person was a known
fornicator, etc. the believers were to disassociate themselves from
this individual. Application: since Egypt has been directly and indirectly
condemned by the scriptures concerning the subject at-hand, it is ill-advised
to ignore the biblical admonition by trying to carry the application
to an extreme and look absurd.

Historical
Background

The
modern translations are based on the work of two nineteenth century
Greek intellectuals from England. B. F. Westcott and F. J. A. Hort
hated the Textus Receptus Greek Text (the foundation for the
King James Bible) and consequently created their own Greek text. Their
text was based primarily on a text type known as the Alexandrian text,
so named because of its origin in Egypt. The Codex Vaticanus (discovered
in the Pope's library in 1481) and Sinaiticus (discovered in
1859 in a trash can at St. Catherine's monastery on Mt. Sinai) were
the two texts that influenced the Alexandrian text type the most.

It
is important to understand that the attacks on the word of God found
in these manuscripts originated in one location - Alexandria, Egypt.
Such pagan Greek “scholars” as Origen and Clement of Alexandria were
the men that had the greatest adverse affect on these texts. In AD
313, the Roman emperor Constantine ordered fifty copies of the “word
of God” from Eusebius, the Bishop of Caesarea. Eusebius, who was a
devout student of Origen's work, chose to send him manuscripts filled
with Alexandrian corruption, rather than sending him the true
word of God found in the Syrian text from Antioch, Syria. The corrupt
Alexandrian text (also called the "Egyptian") found its way
into the Vatican manuscript, then into the Westcott and Hort Greek
Text, and eventually into the new bible versions found in almost every
local Christian bookstore.

Scriptural
Support for Rejection of Alexandrian
(Egyptian) Texts"

From
the scripture that follows, one can easily see that the LORD dispels
any notion that Egypt should be treated as any other country. This
is the very land from which the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus manuscripts
originated. One can be certain that He did not send His Levitical
scribes to Egypt and bless them there with the task of preserving
His holy word. Instead, the LORD says He is going to consume (kill)
them all. He wants His people OUT of Egypt.

Jeremiah
44:26 Therefore hear ye the word of the LORD, all Judah
that dwell in the land of Egypt;
Behold, I have sworn by my great name, saith the LORD, that my name
shall no more be named in the mouth of any man of Judah in all the
land of Egypt, saying, The Lord GOD liveth.

His
name will not be named by those Israelites dwelling in the land of
Egypt. The Egyptians, of course, are Arabs. Most of the Arab countries
are determined to eradicate the nation of Israel at any cost. Some
might point to Anwar Sadat of Egypt as a leader of an Arab nation
willing to consider peace with Israel. Consider this politician.

The
first year he became premier of Egypt, he led Egypt into war with
Israel! The encyclopedia calls him a pragmatist…(that is, he could
not wipe out Israel so he tried to negotiate). “A
pragmatist, Sadat indicated his willingness to consider a negotiated
settlement with Israel and shared the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize with
Menachim Begin as a result of the Camp David Accords. He was assassinated
by Muslim extremists, who were opposed to his peace initiative with
Israel.”

Now
consider the background: Sadat signed a peace treaty with Israel
in 1979 and was assassinated two years later. He was assassinated
because of the peace treaty, and the assassination occurred while
he was reviewing a military parade that marked the eighth anniversary
of the crossing of the Suez Canal. In other words, he won the
Nobel Peace Prize, but continued to celebrate his country’s attack
on Israel! Is he a good example of Egypt’s acceptance of Israel?
He was a politician who did things that were politically expedient.
Muslims hate Israel, America and anything non-Muslim. The scripture
continues its condemnation of the Jews in Egypt.

Jeremiah
44:27 Behold,
I will watch over them for evil, and not for good: and all
the men of Judah that are in the land of Egypt shall
be consumed by the sword and by the famine, until there
be an end of them.

God
allows us to find the truth through a search of the scriptures. The
LORD wanted His people out of Egypt. He consumed any of them that
remained there. The modern critic wants us to believe that God then
used this same region to preserve His word through the Roman Catholic Vaticanus and Sinaiticus manuscripts.
God emphatically differentiates between His words and those of the
Jewish Egyptians!

Jeremiah
44:28 Yet
a small number that escape the sword shall return out of the
land of Egypt into the land of Judah, and all the remnant of
Judah, that are gone into the land of Egypt to sojourn
there, shall know whose words shall stand, mine, or theirs.

It
sounds as if God insured that the remnant of Judah would be able
to differentiate between His words and theirs. It is unfortunate
that man does not seem to possess the same capacity to discern truth
from error today. Consider some of the other biblical passages which
cast a definite negative light on Egypt.

Genesis
12:10-13 – Because
of the Egyptians, Abraham is concerned for his life and the
safety of his wife. Also note that this concerns the genealogical
line of Christ (Matthew 1:1-2).

Genesis
37:36 –
Joseph is sold into Egypt as a slave. Did Egypt bring upon itself the
curse of God pronounced against all those that curse Israel (Genesis
12:3)?

Genesis
50:25-26 – The
first book of the Bible ends with Joseph’s being placed into
a coffin in Egypt.

In
spite of all of the scriptural evidence against the possibility of
God’s using Egypt to preserve His word, the Bible critics continue
to hold to this unscriptural position. The following comments plainly
reveal their position. According to the same article written by Gary
Hudson, Bob
Ross (See
Who is Bob Ross?) theorizes as follows concerning Egypt:

We
should also remember the wonderful Providence of the Lord in regard
to Moses, Joseph and the Israelites in Egypt, as well as how the
infant Jesus was taken to Egypt as a means of escaping death in Israel
during the time of Herod’s campaign of infanticide. The Lord is Sovereign
in Egypt as well as in Antioch, Jerusalem, and Rome! He works His
wonders all over! In fact, if you had to have the “right place”
in which the Lord could do His work, it would have to be a “wrong place,” as
the whole world is defiled by sin.

In
other words, the right place would have to be the wrong place. This
position ignores God’s specific condemnation. Read Jeremiah chapter
44 again. This theory makes as much sense as attributing all the
variations between the Textus Receptus and the modern versions
to God’s people. According to the critics, the modern versions are
necessary because God chose Egypt (and the Catholic Church) to preserve
His word which had been corrupted by well-meaning, over-zealous scribes.
Sounds like some of the logic displayed in the Garden of Eden!

God’s promise of supernatural preservation has not failed during
the last century. Man needs to believe the book God has provided,
rather than trying to correct that which needs no correction. God
used Antioch (Acts 11:26),
not Alexandria, Egypt (Acts 27:6, 28:11) to
preserve His word.

There are many beautiful pictures and types within the word of God.
One of the tremendous pictures found in the last two chapters of
Acts reveals a great illustration of the two lines of Greek texts.
The true text has come from Antioch, and the false texts have originated
in Alexandria, Egypt. Like many other places within the word of God,
a clear spiritual application exists in Acts chapters 27 and 28.